> Eliza Carthy > Songs > Blow the Winds
The Baffled Knight / The Shepherd Lad / Blow the Winds
[
Roud 11
; Child 112
; G/D 2:301
; Ballad Index C112
; VWML RVW2/1/11
; Bodleian
Roud 11
; Wiltshire
254
; Mudcat 64609
, 149112
; trad.]
Gavin Greig collected The Shepherd Laddie from Mrs Gillespie of Buchan, Aberdeenshire, in 1905. In 1925 it was included in Alexander Keith's book Last Leaves of Traditional Ballads and Ballad Airs.
Ewan MacColl sang The Shepherd Lad in 1956 on his and A.L. Lloyd's Riverside anthology The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Volume I.
Peter Kennedy recorded Emily Bishop singing this song as The Baffled Knight in the 1950s for the BBC. This recording was included on the anthology The Child Ballads 2 (The Folk Songs of Britain Volume 5; Caedmon 1961; Topic 1968) and in 2012 on the Topic anthology Good People, Take Warning (The Voice of the People Series Volume 23).
Sam Larner of Winterton, Norfolk, sang Blow Away the Morning Dew in a recording made by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger in 1958-60. It was released in 1961 on his Folkways anthology Now Is the Time for Fishing.
Cilla Fisher sang The Shepherd Lad in 1978 on her and Artie Trezise' Kettle (UK) and Folk-Legacy (USA) album For Foul Day and Fair.
Ian Robb and Hang the Piper sang Clear Away the Morning Dew in 1979 on their Folk-Legacy album Ian Robb and Hang the Piper. Ian noted:
One of the first traditional songs I ever learned, the bulk of the text and the tune coming from The Singing Island by Ewan Maccoll and Peggy Seeger.
I have always been attracted by smart remarks in songs, and the “maid within, fool without” line is one of my favourite ambiguities.
Roy Harris sang Clear Away the Morning Dew in 1985 on his Fellside album Utter Simplicity.
Cyril Barber of Felsham, Suffolk, sang Hail the Dewy Morning on one of Veterans Songs Sung in Suffolk cassettes published in 1987/89, and on the 2000 Veteran anthology CD, Songs Sung in Suffolk
Eliza Carthy sang Blow the Winds in 1998 on her album Rice, accompanying herself on fiddle and djembe, and with Ed Boyd playing bouzouki. They followed it by Eliza's tune The Game of Draughts. This track was reissued in 2003 on Eliza's anthology The Definitive Collection.
Karine Polwart sang this song as Shepherd Lad in 2001 on Battlefield Band's CD Happy Daze. Their sleeve notes commented:
This is the only song we know about skinny dipping in Scotland, a chilly and ill-advised pursuit in the best of weather! It features a twist on the common ballad tale of a nasty young man who takes advantage of a girl. In fact, the shepherd lad is far too modest for this lassie. Karine fitted the traditional words to a tune of John [McCusker]'s.
Mick Groves sang Bonnie Shepherd Lad on his 2004 album of songs of Ewan MacColl, Fellow Journeyman.
Lisa Knapp sang this song as Dew Is on the Grass in 2007 on her CD Wild & Undaunted. Her source is The Dew Is on the Grass as sung by Jake Willis of Hadleigh, Suffolk, to Ralph Vaughan Williams in September 1907; which was printed in Roy Palmer's 1983 book Folk Songs Collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Rachael McShane sang Shepherd Lad in 2009 on her Navigator CD No Man's Fool.
Heidi Talbot sang The Shepherd Lad in 2010 on her Navigator CD The Last Star.
Jim Mageean sang Blow Away the Morning Dew in 2012 on the anthology of songs collected from John Short by Cecil Sharp, Short Sharp Shanties Vol. 3: Sea Songs of a Watchet Sailor. The album's notes commented:
[Richard Runciman] Terry [in The Shanty Book Part II (J. Curwen & Sons Ltd., London. 1924)] comments that although Short started his Blow Away the Morning Dew with a verse of The Baffled Knight, he then digresses into floating verses. In fact three of the verses recorded and published by Terry, not one derive from The Baffled Knight! Short sang only the “flock of geese” verse to Sharp. Sharp did not publish the shanty, but other authors also give Baffled Knight versions. The other predominant version in collections is the American whaling version but still using the tune associated with The Baffled Knight and the chorus remaining close to the usual words.
The text used here is virtually all Short via Terry — the addition being the “new-mown hay” verse which comes straight from The Baffled Knight.
Andy Turner sang this song as Stroll Away the Morning Dew as the 20 May 2012 entry of his project A Folk Song a Week. He noted in his blog:
This was a song which, in [Maud Karpeles'] The Crystal Spring, is given the title of The Baffled Knight, and which Sharp collected in Warehorne on 23 September 1908 from James Beale. Even at 18 I realised, I think, that The Baffled Knight was a ballad scholar’s title, not what a traditional singer would have used (it doesn’t even mention a knight in Mr Beale’s song—it’s a shepherd’s son who is “baffled”). A few years later, when I looked at the copy of Sharp’s manuscripts in the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library, I found that in fact Mr Beale had also sung “Stroll away the morning dew”, rather than the more usual “Blow away the morning dew”. So that’s what I’ve sung ever since, and that’s how I refer to the song.
Steve Roud included The Baffled Knight in 2012 in The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs. Lucy Ward, James Findlay, Bella Hardy and Brian Peters sang it a year later on the accompanying Fellside CD The Liberty to Choose: A Selection of Songs from The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs.
Faustus sang Blow the Windy Morning in 2013 on their CD Broken Down Gentlemen. They noted:
From the singing of Emily Bishop on The Voice of the People collection Good People, Take Warning. Recorded by Peter Kennedy at Bromsborough Heath, Herefordshire, 13 October 1952.
Claire Hastings sang Shepherd Lad on the TMSA Young Trad Tour 2016.
You Are Wolf sang The Baffled Knight / The Shepherd Lad on her 2018 album Keld. She noted:
A traditional song in which a man comes across a woman skinny-dipping in a brook. She foxes him into taking her home but doesn’t give him what he hopes for in return. My version borrows from both Eliza Carthy’s Blow the Winds and Lisa Knapp’s Dew Is on the Grass. At some point, the knight was replaced by a shepherd, but I rather liked the earlier title.
The brook was recorded at Gramarye Cottage, County Leitrim, Ireland.
Lyrics
Eliza Carthy sings Blow the Winds | Rachael McShane sings Shepherd Lad |
---|---|
There was a shepherd's son, |
Once there was a shepherd lad, |
Chorus (repeated after each verse): | |
Well he looked east and he looked west, |
He looked east and he looked west, |
Chorus (after every other verse): | |
He raised his head from his green bed | |
“It's fitter for a lady fair | |
She said: “Sir, don't touch my mantle, |
“If you'll not touch my mantle |
“I will not touch your mantle, |
“I'll not touch your mantle |
And when she out of the water came, | |
He mounted her on a milk white steed, |
And he's put her on a milk white steed, |
And as they rode along the road |
And as they rode along the way |
And when they came to her father's house |
And when they came to her father's gate |
When the gates were opened |
And when the gates were open |
“There is a horse in my father's stable, | |
“There is cock in my father's yard, | |
“And there is a flower in my father's garden, |
“Oh so fare you well my modest boy, |
Says the shepherd's son as he doffed his shoes, | |
Jake Willis sings The Dew Is on the Grass | Lisa Knapp sings Dew Is on the Grass |
As I walked out one midsummer morn |
As I walked out one midsummer's morn |
Chorus (after each verse): |
Chorus (after each verse): |
I boldly stepped up to her |
I boldly stepped up to her |
“Wait till you get to my father's house |
“O but if you come to my father's house |
O when she got to her father's hall, |
But when we got to her father's house, |
“When you met with me at first |
“O when you met with me at first |
“And when you meet a pretty maid |
“And if you meet a pretty girl |
“There is a cock in my father's yard, |
“There is a cock in my father's garden |
“There is a flower in my father's garden, |
“There is a flower in my father's garden |
Acknowledgements
Transcribed from the singing of Eliza Carthy by Garry Gillard.